Nehemiah 6:9 –
They were just trying to intimidate us, imagining that they could discourage us and stop the work. So I continued the work with even greater determination.
In this chapter “Sanballat, Tobiah, Geshem the Arab, and the rest of our enemies” were trying to meet with Nehemiah to stop his work on the wall. Guess they realized a strong Jerusalem was a danger to them, so they tried to deceive Nehemiah into meeting with them. Although the chapter does not specifically mention what they were planning on doing, Nehemiah saw through their ploy and continued working.
This happens today only slightly different, instead of sending messengers they send lawyers. How many times have you heard construction was halted because of protected wildlife or some other reason? Sure many times they may have a honest point to protect the environment, but most of the time test complaints appear to be halting progress for other agendas. A leader must be able to understand when that pack of lawyers has an honest concern and just wants to see harm to the progress.
The fact Nehemiah was able to do this shows he was wise and knowledgeable of deception shows his qualities of being a great leader. Much of the time it’s not because God audibly speaks to them, but more they can distinguish God’s will with them. Oh how I wish I had a better gage on “God’s will” in my life. Unfortunately as you have seen, my hindsight is 20/20 where I see what happened or what I should have done. But the fact there are so many “should have’s” in my life I know I am not hearing Him clearly.
The one thing I can say that has helped is reading the Bible and praying daily. In doing this, I have learned what God’s desires in others’ lives was and see the thread between them. I can then filter the noise and “other” prompts to determine what is God and what is not. Even as I write this my brain in thinking back to many stories in the Bible of casting lots and figure now is the time to cast lots or little white balls to gain fortune. And no I am not going to by a lottery ticket because I think God is saying so … but you can see the types of struggles we can have daily between distinguishing God’s desires and our own.